USS Iowa's Guns Are Now For Show02:59

On Saturday, the USS Iowa battleship opens its decks to visitors in the Port of Los Angeles in San Pedro. The battleship, commissioned by the Navy for World War II, will now serve as a museum.

On a gray morning, former USS Iowa crew member Mike McEnteggart shows off the ship's main deck. McEnteggart first arrived on the Iowa in 1985, fresh out of boot camp.

The USS Iowa, berthed at its new permanent home in the Port of Los Angeles in San Pedro, Calif. The decommissioned ship will now be a museum. (Pacific Battleship Center)

"I was 20 years old," he says. "Just barely 20 years old."

McEnteggart served on the ship for four years. Across his shoulder is a tattoo of the battleship and "BB-61," the ship's technical name. He leans back on the barrel of a what looks like a giant cannon.

"This is the right gun, Turret 1. It's 67 feet long, brother. Look at the size of it. I could put you in this," he says.

The Iowa was decommissioned in 1990, and now the ship is beginning a second life. McEnteggart has come back to help.

A Famous Guest

Mike McEnteggart served on the USS Iowa for four years. He moved to Los Angeles to help when he heard the ship was being refurbished. (Will Stone for NPR)

The Iowa's curator is Dave Way. Down below, he travels through the ship's tight passageways to the captain's cabin, which once housed a famous passenger.

"This was President [Franklin] Roosevelt's cabin that he used during the crossing over to North Africa to attend the Tehran conference with [British Prime Minister Winston] Churchill and [Soviet Premier Joseph] Stalin," he says.

The leaders planned D-Day in that 1943 meeting. Way stands inside a modest room. Just through the doorway, there's a bathtub that was installed for Roosevelt. It looks a little small for a president, though.

"Well, the one thing you pick up on, walking around the ship, is creature comforts are secondary. Everything is built around delivering the ordnance to the target," Way says.

A Cold War And Final Fire

After World War II, the Iowa served in the Korean conflict. In the early '80s, the Reagan administration used the ship as part of its Cold War-era strategy.

In his four years on board, McEnteggart never saw combat. Still, he remembers one particularly uneasy encounter with a Russian battleship in the Atlantic.

"They came so close to us once. I bet she wasn't even 100 yards off us," he says.

Most of the Iowa crew was on the main deck that day, and the Russian crew was on theirs.

"We were looking at them and they were looking at us ... we didn't want to fight," he says. "You know, nobody wanted it. It was like 'Oh, they're men just like we are.' "

For McEnteggart, returning to the Iowa is primarily about honoring the memory of former crew mates. In 1989, an accidental explosion in the second turret killed 47 men and endangered the entire crew. McEnteggart helped put the fire out.

"That's why I'm here today," he says.

When he heard they were restoring the ship, McEnteggart left his home in New York and moved to California to work on the Iowa. He's back on board and taking his duties as seriously as ever. Even though it won't be leaving port again, McEnteggart plans to stay with the 70-year-old ship for as long as it needs him.